Chapter 8: The Wrong Gate

The car came in two minutes, not three.

It was a grey sedan with no plates, and it rolled to a stop at the steel door with its engine running.

The driver was one of Gaspare's men.

I had seen him carrying crates at the estate a hundred times and never learned his name.

"Signora Lanzetta. Get in."

Nella pushed me into the back seat and slid in beside me.

The car pulled away before the door shut.

Through the rear window I watched the port hall burn.

Black smoke rose from the roof, and fire trucks were pouring through the main gate with their sirens screaming.

Everyone in that crowd believed I was inside.

In the morning, so would the rest of Sicily.

"Where is the helicopter?" I asked.

"The roof of the cold storage on Via del Porto. Four minutes."

He drove fast and without lights.

The radio under the dashboard crackled, and a voice said something in code.

The driver listened and swore under his breath.

"What is it?"

"Ficarra's men are at the north dock gate, Signora. Thirty at least. They hit the guard post with rifles."

I felt Nella stiffen beside me.

"That's nowhere near the hall," she said.

"No. They wanted that gate."

"Why that gate?" I said.

My voice came out very calm.

"The Don's men think they were told something. That the Signora would leave that way."

He looked at me in the mirror.

"Nobody in our Family knew that. The plan was the west door, and only five of us knew it."

I looked out of the window at the orange glow over the cranes.

I thought of my father on the terrace, with his cigar stopped halfway to his mouth.

North gate. On the dock.

Good girl, he had said.

The envelope on his desk had not been for Venera's marriage.

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